


Unrequited

by Sabriel (the_one_a_m_writer)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Aromantic Character, Aromantic Tony Stark, Own Voices, Platonic Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2021-02-26 19:14:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21613777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_a_m_writer/pseuds/Sabriel
Summary: So it's a fic where Character A is magicked and the spell can only be broken by true love's kiss etc.But Tony Stark is incapable of love.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 19
Kudos: 74





	Unrequited

**Author's Note:**

> welp yeah it's 1 am. guess who's projecting onto their characters again. (me.) guess who wrote this in one go and didn't edit it. (also me.) (sorry.)

It was the reason he and Pepper broke up, but also the reason they stayed good friends afterward. It's hard to commit, see, to someone who can't love you back. 

And it was Pepper who told Tony that perhaps he was aromantic after he confessed to her that he was worried that he wasn't loving her right. She told him that maybe what he was experiencing friendship in a deep and sincere way, a way he'd only ever experienced with Rhodey before. 

(And it was okay, she said, that he came to her with these questions. Being aspec and trans, she'd done all this research trying to figure herself out throughout her life, and she might as well give it to Tony.) 

Tony found himself in an interesting state of being just out of a relationship and really not minding. When the team asked, he answered honestly that he and Pepper had broken up, but were still friends. They seemed to accept it at face value, and asked no further questions; when Valentine's rolled around a month later, he did get Clint at his door checking in, but Tony evaluated idea of couples and dates and mushy things like flowers and told Clint with incredible sincerity that he was fine, thanks. 

And that was that. 

.

.

.

No, it wasn’t. Oh, god, it wasn’t. Tony didn’t realize before how much  _ physical intimacy _ came of dating someone. Not kisses, forget those; not making someone breakfast or whatever the fuck couples do, that was useless. No. It was curling up on the couch with Pepper that he missed desperately. God, what Tony wouldn’t give for a movie night. For casual hugs. For her tapping his shoulder and him tapping her hand. For  _ touch.  _

Tony, gripping Rhodey’s forearms, confessed in his own way that he missed it dearly, regardless of his lack of romantic intent towards Pepper. Confessed that he feared he’d been to hasty in thinking he was aromantic. 

“You’re a dumbass,” Rhodey told him instead, and gave him a hug. A proper one. One where he pulled Tony’s head to his chest, where it fell naturally, and wrapped his arms fully around Tony. The hug he’d given him after every near-death experience. 

“Wait, this is really nice,” Tony mumbled. 

“Hugs tend to be nice,” Rhodey agreed. 

Ah. 

Tony tested out his ability to touch people-- platonically, to platonically touch people-- by initiating contact. By tapping their shoulders. By bumping into them as they passed in the hall. Tony started walking around the backs of their chairs, resting his hands on their heads as he did so. 

And they started reciprocating. 

Steve was all too willing to pull Tony towards himself as they laughed at some joke, so that their sides met. Natasha started running her fingers through his hair whenever she wanted to, which was always. (And her nails felt so nice on his scalp.) Bruce quickly developed some sort of odd Science Bros Secret Handshake with him, wherein as one of them left a room the other was in, they paused briefly to curl their hands around each other. Clint was more of the back-slapping bro type, and Thor was into bone-crushing hugs. 

And then they were having movie nights and game nights and be-around-each-other nights, where they put their heads in each other’s laps and Natasha made everyone spiked cocoa and Tony procured piles of blankets and beanbags so they could more effectively lay on the floor in comfort. It was inevitable, of course, that this morphed into everyone leaving but the workaholic (Tony) and the serum-created insomniac (Steve), and Steve would sit with Tony, nearby, always in contact, as Tony worked. 

And then Tony found himself waking up alone after a nightmare again, and instead of going down to the workshop, he stopped at the turnoff to the elevator. 

The lounge. There was a light on in the lounge. 

Steve was in the lounge. 

Wordlessly, Tony slipped in and curled up against Steve’s side the same way he did during movie nights, the way that made him feel safe and protected-- physically, because Steve was large Tony could burrow into his chest. 

Steve slipped an arm around him, and his other hand went to Tony’s hair. 

Tony didn’t sleep that night. The nightmares didn’t get better. But being in the lounge next to Steve felt better than being in the workshop alone. 

.

.

.

The call to assemble rang through the building, and Tony didn’t immediately obey it, because there was no way to safely stop the experiment in the middle of it. 

Tony assigned as much as he could to DUM-E and JARVIS, sacrificing any recognizable results, and still had a half minute of damage control to do. He shouted as much to the team through the comms as soon as the suit assembled around him, and Steve gave the affirmation. 

Realistically, this thirty seconds was not what got Steve captured. 

Internally, Tony catalogued, after the battle was done, every enemy he could have hit in those thirty seconds. Quite a few. Those enemies wouldn’t have temporarily waylaid Clint. Clint would have seen the people sneaking up on Steve. Steve wouldn’t be captured. 

Hence why Tony was tearing through this building manically, knowing that Steve entered it and didn’t leave. His combs of traffic cams had told him as much. Clint, Natasha, and Bruce, none having the top speed he did, were waiting for his call, or trying to calm him down, or something-- semantics. Thor, whatever. 

There. 

Steve.

Oh, God, Steve. 

He was unnaturally asleep. His chest rose and fell, but something about the sleep was so, so un-Steve-like. Tony stepped forward. 

“He won’t wake,” said a voice. 

“Who the fuck are you?” Tony asked, spinning around. Silently, JARVIS patched him back through to Clint, Natasha and Bruce. 

“He won’t wake,” it repeated. 

“Fuck you.  _ Fuck you.” _

“We are the Magical Order of the Rose. The sleep can only be broken by the kiss of one who returns his love. He won’t wake. He won’t wake. We are the Magical Order of the Rose. The sleep can only be--”

It was a goddamn recording. Tony squeezed it in his gauntlet and it became powder.

.

.

.

“It’s not good,” Bruce said, “but you knew that.” 

Yeah. He did know. There was no denying the impossible images from the MRI. They’d run every scan, and determined that there was, indeed, some magical field around Steve’s brain. 

“Do you have anything else, Tony?” 

“Fuck. Okay. Um, I didn’t listen, because I thought it wasn’t magical. But they did say--”

Tony nearly jumped out of his skin when JARVIS played the recording. 

“What does that mean?” Clint asked. “The kiss thing?” 

“Fuck if I know!” Tony shouted at him. Instantly, the regret pulled at him-- Clint wasn’t grilling him for answers, Clint was just asking, but whatever. Steve. Steve was  _ hurt.  _

_ Fuck. _

“The kiss of one who returns his love,” Natasha said. “Parse it out, boys. Steve loves someone. If that person loves him, they need to give him a kiss.”

“Cool, so we find--” Tony snapped his fingers, pacing the room, shaking with energy. Fuck but it was so much worse with magic. He couldn’t know it and control it, he had to obey it. “We find whatever-her-name. Agent 13.” 

Natasha shook her head. 

“No? No?? Work with me here, who does he like? Does he have a goddamn-- diary or something?” 

But Tony turned and caught sight of Bruce’s face, because Bruce was lighting up, slowly-- grinning? 

“Bruce?” 

“It’s  _ you.” _

Tony’s stomach dropped out. 

“No.” 

“No, he asked me the other day. Weird questions about you. JARVIS has them recorded.” 

“No.” 

“Y’all are buddies. This is cute,” Clint said. “They were roommates. Oh my god, they were roommates!” 

“No,” Tony repeated. “Say psych.” 

“You love him,” Natasha offered. 

“I’m aromantic,” Tony said. The first time. The first time he’d said so out loud. “I’m aromantic. I can’t love him.”

“But you’re so--!” 

Natasha mimed cutting her throat at Clint, who broke off immediately. 

.

.

.

Bruce had crescent marks where Tony had gripped his hand tight. Natasha had run her hands through his hair and left the room, taking Clint with her. 

“Do you want to try anyway?” Bruce asked. 

Tony stood up and walked mechanically to the bedside. 

“Nothing to lose,” he said, and bent down, closer to Steve’s sleeping face. Sure. Just like any other kiss on the lips, right?

Right? With the same pointless emptiness. It felt like nothing. Like lips. 

And still Steve slept. 

“Why’d you pick me, you fucking moron?” Tony asked.

Steve didn’t answer. If Tony focused on his sleeping face and not his body, he looked calmly and normally asleep. 

He looked young. 

And via some latent protective instinct, Tony leaned down and kissed his forehead, near his hairline, and smoothed down his hair. 

“I’ll find a--” 

Steve gasped. 

.

.

.

He’d propelled himself off the bed and onto the floor, kneeling, while Tony rubbed his back. “Are you okay?” 

“I’m okay,” Steve said. “A little panicky. Coming down off it.” 

Bruce blinked, not used to Steve’s candid answers. Tony didn’t have the heart to tell him Steve didn’t know Bruce was in the room. 

“They were saying something about true love. True love’s kiss.” 

“Yeah, I know. We’ll deal with them later.” Behind his back, Tony motioned Bruce out of the room. “The kiss of someone who returns your love.” 

“Who returns my...?”

Steve looked up so hopefully.  _ Fuck.  _

“Listen, I’m-- I’m aromantic.” 

“You’re what?”

“I can’t love someone romantically. I can’t-- I just don’t.” 

“But your kiss woke me.” 

“I kissed you on the forehead,” Tony admitted. “I kissed you on the lips first. It didn’t work.” 

“So you love me. As a friend.”

“Yeah, I guess-- I guess I do.” 

“I’m sorry you had to find out,” Steve said, turning to sit up, and in the process taking his shoulder from Tony’s hand. “If I could pick someone else I--” 

“Is it okay if I don’t stop?” 

“Hm?” 

“Touching you.” 

“What do you...?”

“Cuddling you,” Tony said. “At 4 am.” 

“I thought you would have wanted to stop.” 

“Because you have feelings for me?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Are you going to-- what the fuck, Steve. Are you going to-- what would you even do? Take emotional advantage of me?” 

“Probably nothing,” Steve said. “Pine. I don’t know. Try to work up the courage to ask you on a date. But I guess that’s moot.” 

“You mean, like, the two of us can have a meal at a restaurant together?” 

“Yeah. Probably.” 

“Sounds fun,” Tony said, crouching closer to Steve. “I mean, I won’t be thinking of you the same way you’re thinking of me. But what if we went out and had italian and then we cuddled on the couch?”

“You don’t want that.” 

“Sure I do. As a friend. I’m realizing, Steve, I’m realizing something new about myself, too. I really do love you. I may love you the same way I love Bruce and Clint and Natasha and Thor and Pepper and Rhodey, but I also love  _ you. Steve. _ And as a friend, I’d love to go out to dinner with you.”

. 

. 

.

In the end, it’s not marriage, or even exclusivity. It’s team dinners or individual ones, it’s cuddling on the couch again, it’s any one of a thousand things they do together. And it’s Tony worrying constantly about his team, and Steve worrying constantly about Tony and his team. Approximately once every two months, someone gets hurt bad enough to go to medical overnight. Tony, who isn’t a superstitious person, nevertheless kisses their forehead every time. 

And Steve really does find someone else. Saves someone else, actually. It’s Bucky. But Bucky turns out to be as much of a slut for cuddles and hair-fussing as Tony, and fits well into the dynamic. 

God, but Tony loves them. 

**Author's Note:**

> aromanticism is weird. i'm very lucky to have people to love who love me and provide me with cuddles. if anyone wants to talk. theoneamwriter@gmail.com. i come with one (1) good reviews; helped my aro friend learn abt aromanticism :)


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